A Symphony of Ashes [A mini epic]
by Reveena
Summary: Five years after the EW timeline. Trowa and Relena,two very defferent people ,are pulled together to face something no one saw coming. Or did they?
1. A Symphony of Ashes One

Notes: It was 3.AM last night when I was attempting to get more of EarthQuakes done. But something happened and I started to write something totally deferent. I ran with it. I don't know where this is going at all. I'd love any feel back you have about it.  
  
  
  
Tones of Reds 1/??  
By R-chan (reveena)  
  
The candles had burned low.  
  
Every one had left.  
  
The food and drink had been discreetly put away in the kitchen and the   
plain vases with their dull colored flowers had disappeared in much the   
same manner.  
  
But she was still there. Still sitting silent and as unmoving as stone on   
the window ledge, eyes focused on something no one else could see and lost   
in thoughts only she could read.  
  
Uncharacteristically without words and without action she'd been there all   
day. She'd nodded her thanks to those who approached her and had spilled   
but few words for the people who knew her beyond the political arena.  
  
Unusual was the description that he'd taken to. But then he didn't know her   
at all really, and he'd never considered her before. He could have been   
very wrong in his assumption of her natural behavior. He'd never had a   
reason to question it anyway. He'd always been too busy to stop and   
consider her. He suspected it was the same in her case.  
  
Which may have had something to do with why neither felt compelled to shake   
the thick silence that had tightly webbed around them.  
  
The candles were nearly out.  
  
The twilight of dusk had begun to creep into the large hall of the temple.   
Trowa took a moment to gaze at the sun as it dipped below the horizon in a   
brilliant death of purple, red, yellow and orange. Moments that felt like   
sand running from his hands passed before the bright star completed its   
journey and he and his company were cast into a dim darkness.  
  
Only then did Relena move from her perch, and only then did he take note of   
the red tones in her hair, brought out by the odd angle in which in the   
light hit her. In the back of his mind he wondered dully what else he'd   
failed to take notice of in the last five years. And those before it.  
  
Much, his mind replied. Too much.  
  
The twenty-two year old woman walked silently down the dark blue carpet and   
stopped when she reached one of two large photos. Silently he pushed off   
the wall and stepped beside her, not really seeing the smiling blue eyes   
that stared back at him.  
  
"Why do you suppose they insisted we go through with this pointless   
ceremony?" she asked, and the quiet shattered.  
  
Trowa slid his hands in the pockets of his slacks. Quatre had picked them   
out years ago. This was the first time he'd ever worn them. "They were   
trying to get the matter over with quickly." He answered truthfully.  
  
She turned-there that red was again-and hugged her arms around her waist.   
"As if saying 'Now-you're-time-is-up-and-the-game-is-over'? "  
  
Trowa favored her with a detached shrug. "I imagine you'd know better than   
I. I don't have much use for the motive of politics Minister."  
  
The Not So Obvious redhead answered him with an expression of coyness. " I   
suppose not," then her face shifted to something that resembled admiration   
and anger as she looked back at the photo.  
  
"My dear Dorothy, what ever will the council think when they realize the   
trick you've pulled on them?"  
  
Trowa's interest perked inwardly "A trick?" he inquired. The brown haired   
young man had the impression he was venturing into deep water with his   
question, but part of him was more preoccupied with the want to obtain the   
information than questioning his limits as a mere acquaintance.  
  
The blue eyed woman half turned and looked upon him with ill concealed   
skepticism.  
  
"The bodies were never found Mr. Barton. What makes you know for sure they   
are dead? The plane that crash landed over the Atlantic was carrying my   
lover." she started "A resourceful woman who enjoys ruffling the council's   
tail feathers whenever and however she can and causing conflict in the   
World Nation's circles when the opportunity presents it's self. She also   
had a need of *him*. You should know that. Tell me in perfect honesty that   
they are dead, Sir and I will tell you with perfect sincerity that you are   
full of shit."  
  
Inside he was slightly taken aback. But it never registered on his face. It   
remained passive and without emotion. He forced a look at the picture of   
his lover, the lover he'd married, the one he'd ever let near him and the   
man he'd taken to as his soul for a time. The lover the world recognized as   
dead.  
  
"Hn." was the only response she received.  
  
The silence then began to craw along the skin of his arms and for the first   
time in a while he felt awkward in his own skin and unsure of what was   
called of him next.  
  
Dorothy and Quatre's untimely death to the blue of the sea held a   
corrupting feel to it. Quatre was not dead. But rather, quite alive. It was   
an instinct that pulsed in his blood like thick rivers of lava. Yet somehow   
the heat of it didn't penetrate the icy rock around his heart. Just severe   
disappointment in himself and Quatre...and overwhelming loss. For both of them.  
  
You worked so hard at showing me humanity and the strength of emotion   
Quatre. Fed me you're love on a silver spoon even when I didn't think I was   
hungry for it. Yet in the end, it was Dorothy who'd called you're   
compassion and not much later you're misplaced affection. Trowa wondered   
was there something in the woman who couldn't cry that drew you like it   
does mouths to the flames? It that why you felt the need to have death fool   
every one? To be with her?  
  
Too many questions to be answered too soon and with little hope of finding   
them. He pushed himself away from the train of thought. There was no use in   
getting involved with that inner quarrel. Their last few years should have   
been enough of a warning. The silence. The eyes. The disagreements and   
forgiveness. The signs had been clear; he'd just chosen to ignore them.  
  
Trowa allowed himself to question Relena's situation. She'd been married to   
the woman his past lover had vanished into the mist with no good bye. Did   
she feel her spouse slowly fall away from her over the last two years as he   
had?  
  
He lingered on that thought; it was a good reason not to ponder his own   
perspective.  
  
Minister Dorlain had been wedded to the person the world and Council had   
thought of as her nemesis. Two very different women, from outward   
appearance to operation of thinking had fallen hard for each other, from   
what the shocked and entertained world had seen anyway. The news that the   
former Queen of the  
World had fallen in love with another woman, a woman who was her enemy no   
less, had sent the Nations into a frenzy as Trowa recalled. Almost as much   
as Quatre's intention to marry him had been.  
  
Now the late Dorothy "Cat" Dorlain was 'dead' and with *his* husband.  
  
"Did you love her Minister?"  
  
Relena turned a bit, unsure of how to answer. Love Dorothy? Their   
relationship had been based on conquest. A battle with just the two of them.  
A battle that had one day stated in her office and ended in her chambers.   
Dorothy showed her things she'd never considered before and she in return   
had given Dorothy her challenge and defiance.  
  
Relena stared into the picture in deep thought. There had been affection.   
Great affection, but love? No. She really didn't think so. There had been a   
dark attraction between them and need. There was nothing so pure as love in   
their courtship or marriage. That had been the irony of her life as the   
dove of peace.  
  
"Love, Mr. Barton, had little to do with us, " her gaze shifted over to the   
photo her tall companion faced. Quatre Winner. "Now, I think I may know why."  
  
Trowa turned to face her then, he leaned down close to where she could   
nearly feel his lips brush the skin of her ear.  
  
"You're lying Minister."  
  
Relena turned her head so she could look him in the eye, her own gaze   
narrowing in challenge.  
  
"So...are you."  
  
With a graceful twist and step she widened the physical distance between   
them, putting the sleek curve of her back to him. A hand on her hip she   
stared out into the velvet night with its diamond stars blinking   
mysteriously at her. The analogy reminded her of Dorothy's own sly ways.   
Relena turned back around to face Trowa.  
  
He hadn't moved. The brown haired man was still facing her from the side,   
the graceful curve of his back casting low flickering shadows on the   
whitish stone walls, long willowy arms at his sides with their white   
sleeves unbuttoned and rolled up to the elbows, hands still carelessly   
resting inside the pockets of the black slacks that clothed his long legs.   
It was his eyes that gave him away she mused. Dark green and shadowed with   
deep emotion that almost glowed in the unusual atmosphere that they had   
created.  
  
Relena looked at him thoughtfully from across the shadowed meeting hall of   
the temple they'd chosen a week ago. You're angry aren't you Trowa? She   
thought. And you don't like it.  
  
"So what will you do now Mr. Barton?"  
  
Trowa shifted positions to look at her fully and considered his next words   
carefully.  
  
"I'll be taking over Quatre's diplomatic duties."  
  
The minister raised a slender eyebrow at him and looked at him serenely.   
"Good luck Mr. Barton."  
  
Trowa nodded slowly at the blond woman wondering what that she could be   
thinking. His eyes followed her form as she made her way back across the   
hall to the door. Her pale hands closed around the bar like handles.   
Pausing she turned her head and Trowa tipped his head slightly in inquiry.  
  
"Don't be like Dorothy, Trowa. Don't die inside because Quatre stopped   
loving you. "  
  
She opened the doors and slipped out as quietly as a ghost.  
  
The candles finally went out.  
  
"Too late."  
  
**  
  
**  
  
  
  
  
  
muffins make every thing okay  
-jay-  
  
Guess it wouldn't be so bad if we WERE making money doing what we love cause   
we'd be loving what we do, ne?  
`~Myheartfortrowa  
________________________________________________________________  
  
R-chan  
Chief Officer of the UHA's FFF (FanFictionForce)  
Keeper of the  
Official Hentai Rule Book,   
Serving under the United Hentai  
Alliance blessed under the Hee-chan,  
sworn to serve Shinigami, shaded by  
Tro-chan's Unibang, protected by  
Q-Man's Maguanacs on High, and  
beloved of the Wu-pie  
  
[R-chan's Gw Fanfiction][1]  
  


   [1]: http://gundamwingfanfiction.cjb.net/



	2. Chapter Two

  
Decadence 2/?*was Tones of Red* By R-chan (Reveena)   
  
Trowa closed the office door softly behind him before he tugged off the offending piece of satin from around his neck and shrugged his jacket off. Unbuttoning the first   
three of his white cotton shirt he made his way to the large window and pressed his forehead to the cool pane of glass.   
  
Earth's star was making it's decent once more into the night's embrace, leaving shadows of gold in its wake along the blue body of the Atlantic. Was Quatre still out there he wondered. Or had the ocean really claimed him? Was the Minister correct in   
her assumptions?  
  
I love the ocean Trowa. It's not like endless sand at all. It's like a living thing with emotions, possible of both love and hate. Not just dry and unforgiving.  
  
The dark haired man tried to will the reminiscent voice away from his thoughts. But the gentle voice of his blond haired lover wouldn't take its leave of him. It was a bittersweet torture he could have gone without.  
  
Was I too much like you're desert Quatre when you felt you could change me into an ocean? Or did I simply become too dry and unforgiving for you to hold on to anymore?   
  
He closed his eyes and pressed   
his hands to the smooth surface. He didn't know. He wasn't sure he *wanted*   
to know. Shifting through the ashes of his soul trying to find the answers was like navigating a labyrinth. One soot -covered path always let him to another, and each dead end was nothing but fragile coals of memories that threatened to crumble into dust. How much had been a lie? How many words had been truth?   
  
The cold night cloak January had fallen over the city finally and reached out before him like a land of lights that stretched out to the sea. It was a night for lovers, with the full moon shining and the sky clear, it was just the atmosphere France was known for. But how many people where in their beds now, wishing their lovers where there with them and not out with another?  
  
Trowa then knew of at least one. Turning slowly he spoke   
softly, "Hello Heero."   
  
Yuy, said to be his less then better half, walked softly away from the shadows of the wide work room, holding his crumpled dress coat over on his forearm.   
  
"Duo won't be pleased when he finds you missing Heero."   
  
The Japanese in question give him a wolfish smirk, gunmetal blue eyes almost glowing with what may or may not have been mirth. "No, I don't suppose he will be." He responded.   
  
Trowa answered the look with a   
brief and amused gaze. His friend moved to be beside him, arms folded and   
back against the glass, seemingly comfortable in the silence. Quite suddenly   
the former clown didn't want silence.   
  
"How is he, Duo, I mean?" The gundam pilot turned Preventer turned his head in an angle and looked out at the lights from over his shoulder with an expression unmarred by readable emotion. "Duo possessed great affection for Quatre...his assumed passing hit him hard," death trained eyes flickered to Trowa's. "He's been his usual   
sickeningly cheery self otherwise."   
  
"That's good to hear" he responded without missing a beat.  
  
"You know Quatre's alive."   
  
"Yes."   
  
"Will you go looking for him?"   
  
"No."  
  
"Why?"   
  
Trowa stepped back from the window and turned to his desk, once Quatre's, and picked up a framed photo of the two of them right after the last true war. The blond had his hand in both of his and pressed to his Arabian heart like a small secret he wanted no one but himself to see and he himself was actually smiling in it.   
  
"Quatre and I died a long time ago." He finally said.   
  
"Trowa-"  
  
"Don't" he interrupted setting himself down in the leather covered chair. It smelled like Quatre, just like the rest of the place. "There's no point in it." He turned the small object face down on the oak surface. He didn't want to see it. Any more of it all   
was like rubbing salt in a fresh wound and he already stung.   
  
"Does Relena know?" Heero asked, shattering the growing still, walking around the desk to the other window and pressing a verinian down with his fingers. Trowa rested   
his chin in his hands, staring out in to the darkness of Quatre's-*his* office. He'd never become accustom to that concept. His office.   
  
You left it all on my shoulders Quatre. Everything, all of it in my name. Why?  
  
That was the question keeping him up into the dark hours of the night. Reading and   
rereading documents of ownership, transgressions and wills till his eyes began to itch and he had almost every word burned into his memory like a branding. How long had Quatre planed it, kept it all hidden away till the day till the day came? Just how much of what his lover ever told him was truth? That was the paradox that kept him in the dark searching for illumination.   
  
The want to find Quatre was hallow in his chest but the desire to know what had driven the blond desert walker to those extreme lengths was the driving force that woke him each morning. It was a type of pain that cursed his thoughts each moment of the day.   
  
A soft whisper in his ghost asked if the Minister was being driven by the same thing. Did sleep avoid her too when she left the Preventer's Head Quarters and retired to her own chambers? Did the wrongs she committed in her own marriage hunt her with   
such startling vividness that it made her question how anything could have   
gone right? His eyes clouded like storms of green ivy. How long had the   
Minister known the truth?   
  
"Trowa?" The clown turned diplomat released the breath he didn't know he's captured in his lungs.   
  
"Yes, She was the first of us to say so."   
  
The tall Japanese man watched the woman in question from behind the blinds of his main office, the one that adjoined his own for convenience.  
  
"Hn." Trowa turned his head to the side in order to look at Heero. The moss haired man was watching the Minister with a slight smirk.  
  
"Peeping Tom."  
  
"Clown." He shot back without blinking then he turned away and laid the wrinkled dress coat over the chair facing him.   
  
"Trowa." he started again but the slender man stopped him with his hand.   
  
"The thing I've appreciated most about our relationship is that it's never been based on pity Heero."   
  
Duo's husband held his gaze for a few moments before the grandfather clock chimed from beside the entrance ringing in the room and rocking the silence like a scream would in a church.  
  
"I won't look for him...or her. Not until you chose to."   
  
Trowa nodded as his companion turned back to the shadows of the room and left, silent as a phantom.   
  
Chose for Quatre? He stretched his arms out in front of him, feeling the muscles of   
his back burn from the strain, then slowly relax. Setting them down he regarded the vertical frame with uncharacteristic coyness.   
  
The last twenty-four months with Quatre had been like a battle he knew he was   
loosing. A Kamikaze mission. Difficulties and conflicts had arisen with the consistency of any Oz mobile suit he'd silenced in the past. The casualties of those fights had been paid with unapproachable silence and unspeakable angst. A price he was paying for now.   
  
He could have eliminated armed enemy's but he hadn't been able to silence the spectrum of screaming emotions that had strung between him and Quatre over two years in the window of a mere three. Three years that nearly restored his concept of humanity. He was twenty-two and widowed to a man that was still alive and with the woman who'd nearly killed him. The irony did manage to penetrate his exterior.  
  
I love the ocean Trowa. It's not like endless sand at all. It's like a living   
thing with emotions, possible of both love and hate. Not just dry and   
unforgiving.  
  
"Did Dorothy become your ocean Quatre?"  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
**  
  
**  
  
  
  
  
  



	3. Chapter Three

Decadence 3/??  
By R-chan (Reveena)   
  
The spacious office had long since been sheltered in velvet darkness. Empty hours had passed from when the sun had fallen in the night's embrace and the midnight hours came. The moon shown brightly in all its mystique and lore, whispering the soft spoken promises of countless oaths of devotion and passion. A gentle wind glided in from the shore and along streets of La Rochelle. It was a night for lovers.  
  
Relena stared at the documents before her, the primly typed words looking back at her like a tangle of foreign speech. The words refused to focus in her uncorporating mind. Every time she closed her eyes there'd she be. Impossible golden hair and mocking eyes of light violet. Her voice chimed in her head like a bitter sweet symphony that just wouldn't stop.   
  
She didn't want to admit it. The yearn to go on pretending it wasn't true was like a burning pain in her chest that grew with each measure of Dorothy's reminiscent voice. She'd lied to Trowa and he'd been right. She had loved Dorothy.   
  
Have you ever truly listened to them Relena? Symphonies are like souls crying out. Intense and beautiful at the same time. Moving from angst to rapture, then coming together somewhere in the middle matching eachother with so much energy....Do you suppose His Excellency would have adored battles so much if he'd known of how wonderful a symphony could be if he listened?  
  
She'd never listened. Relena drew a shaky breath in to starved lungs. Why hadn't she loved enough to listen? Why hadn't she heard it in her voice? How could she have missed the meaning behind the misleading eyes and the silence had raged between them over the past two years? She'd turned away from the unspoken words in their game. She'd let them fester and grow into a tangled web of emotion where sarcasm and the raw truth of so many lies became too blurred to sort out anymore.   
  
Did Quatre hear you're music Dorothy? Was he able to find the emotion in those songs, the ones you used to fill the place in you're heart where war had been you're soul? Is that why you first loved and then left me my dear Dorothy? Because I was a reminder of you're wars when you needed the whisper of a violin to soothe the sprit I never could. Did Quatre become you're symphony?   
  
She wanted to hate him. Wanted to be indignant like anyone else would have been. But what had she lost? Not love. That had died between them a long time ago when they both stopped trying to find what they needed in each other. Theirs was a song that ended long before Dorothy used the bottom of the Atlantic as her escape.   
  
Reaching out she traced her fingertips over the cool and lifeless glass of their picture. Taken right after their no-nonsense wedding. For five years it had been there. Even when the silence had came and the music had stopped. When the lies had become bigger and the trust had slowly drifted away and she knew.   
  
She turned the picture face down.   
  
Have you ever truly listened to them Relena? Symphonies are like souls crying out. Intense and beautiful at the same time. Moving from angst to rapture, then coming together somewhere in the middle matching eachother with so much energy....Do you suppose His Excellency would have adored battles so much if he'd known of how wonderful a symphony could be if he listened?  
  
"I'm sorry I had to be you're war Dorothy."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	4. Chapter Four

  
A Symphony of Ash 4/?  
by Reveena  
  
He closed the door behind him, grateful for the warmth that seeped into his damp skin. Letting himself lean onto the surface of the door and drop his things on the hard wood floor, absorbing the silence, he was content to just stand and ignore his less than dry state. He could recall a time when he would not have been able to do that. He'd be too busy assuring his blond lover a little rain was OK, and yes, it was very good to see him. Not anymore though. Trowa pushed the memories away with a mental shove. Such thoughts made him wonder about too much. Questioning the methods of an angle was simply not on his list of priorities.  
  
Overhead the thunder rumbled and the rain pelted the window overlooking the courtyard. He closed his eyes, savoring the voice of nature. He'd discovered a fondness for thunderstorms in La Rochelle, the way the ocean and the sky met in flux and lightning. It was an easy way to distract himself from the questions in his head: Would he try and find Quatre? Get back what he never really had? Or leave him be with the person that brought him in the sunlight, where he'd always belonged. He knew his answer. The problem would be rather the others would understand that severe truth or not.  
  
Silently he pushed off the door and made his way past the dinning room, not bothering to turn on any lights. He didn't really need them. Besides he found that the silhouette of darkness was a small comfort to him as he moved with soundless ease in to the kitchen.   
  
It was her familiar smell that he noticed first. Her own personal fragrance of faint cranberries mingled with the sent of wet rain from the storm. It lingered in the air and tickled his awareness like a persistent child.  
  
He waited for the sense of intrusion and possibly even anger to seep in and reach him. It didn't. Instead he watched with a type of odd fascination as she moved along the counter, slim, white fingers gliding across the tiles coyly, as if feeling something out through touch alone. Curiosity took him.  
  
"Minister."  
  
Relena's slender form shifted in the shadows and turned to face him, her eyes of sea seeking out his.  
  
The lightning flashed and the kitchen was illuminated in a timeless moment when their eyes met and energy ran thick between them. Trowa took a step towards her, interested in her reaction. She didn't move away. Just captured his gaze and refused to let it go.  
  
"Rashid let me in." she finally said.  
  
"Did he?" he whispered softly.  
  
Trowa felt a type of apprehension clinch his chest when she came closer to him. A dryness, settled in his mouth as she passed in and out of the shadows, shortening the space between them. Barton realized in a rush that he craved space between himself and Relena like fire needed air to consume. Without thought he moved around her, causing their positions to be switched around.  
  
Relena held her breath in her chest, her blood pounding so loudly in her ears the sound nearly overwhelmed the cry of the storm just beyond the walls, her heart beating so franticly in her chest she was almost positive he could hear it.  
  
Lighting flashed again, and for a moment that sent chills skimming the surface of her flesh, she found herself lost in pools of the most intense green she'd ever imagined. It frightened her. What she saw there stirred something in her she didn't recognize. Her emotion ached. The need to touch him was a surprising whisper in her ear that held the tones of a scream.   
  
She'd never wanted to run away so much, or stay so badly.  
  
Relena watched him as he leaned onto the counter and slid his slender hands into his dark colored slacks.  
  
"What are you doing here Minister." Not demanding, not in the lest upset.   
  
She wanted to smile at his question. Such normality, didn't agree with him she mused. She turned away from his gaze and let hers sweep over the large kitchen. She looked back up at him from under her eyelashes as the thunder danced above them. What would he say if she told him, she really didn't know herself? He remained unmoving, seemingly comfortable with the web of tension spun between them. She read him carefully before answering.   
  
"Do I make you nervous Trowa?"  
  
He never blinked "Yes...But I frighten/you/."  
  
And she/was/afraid of him, he made her feel things she didn't understand. And yet she wanted him anyway. She had since she saw him in the twilight of dusk at the ceremony. The hunger that had stirred at the nearness of his lips on her neck that day had woken something she'd long denied.  
  
The way her blood moved when he looked at her defied all logic. How did he do it? Had Dorothy ever done such a thing to her? No, with her she'd had always known what was going on between them; A game. One that sometimes ended in breathless passion, other times it ended in pain that would stay with her for days. With Trowa Barton, she had no answers and didn't know the rules. He allured her and she didn't know why.  
  
"There's something going on here." She whispered, " I'm going to find out what it is Trowa."  
  
Relena took a deep breath and began to close the distance between them. If what had happened between Dorothy and herself over the last five years had taught her anything it was that silence and riddles would not deliver. It had been far too long since she'd reached for anything she truly craved, and she needed touch as much as her lungs needed the tease of air. She would find out what it was about him that made her forget that Dorothy had ever touched her the way she wanted to touch him.  
  
Trowa tried to hold himself very still as she neared. She looked like one of the pagan goddesses Quatre had told him of, a wanton angel with her pale skin and gold hair in wild disarray around her shoulders and calm expression with dark sea eyes. She was nothing like Quatre. Where he was cautious she was reckless, when Quatre would gentle his approach and seek another way, Relena was the type who'd knock down the door if it were locked. She was intense compared to Quatre, whose manor was like wind over the desert. She'd do nothing but make things more difficult.  
  
Relena lifted her arms and set them on his shoulders. She glided them up his neck and settled them around his jaw line. She pressed close to him, her curves molding to his angles. He was like a rock under her touch. It didn't hinder her.  
  
He held himself stiff, the urge to put his arms around her and scout out her other differences gnawing at him. He closed his eyes when he felt her lips touch his skin. Would the Minister burn him the same way Quatre's desert soul had? Would he be able to stop her? Did he really want to?  
  
Too many questions Barton, he thought in a rush.  
  
He could feel the heat of her skin press close and seep though the wetness of his shirt, warming his skin. He wanted to posses that heat.  
  
No, no, he couldn't-wouldn't do this.  
  
"This can't happen."  
  
She looked up at him, the kitchen was briefly bathed in white again, and leaned close to him. She didn't say anything. He felt her mouth press over his. Hard, with more passion then any storm, and his body jumped in response, hungry for it. An emotion he hadn't felt in longer then he cared to remember flared to life. Her arms moved around him, pulling him deeper in her kiss. She tasted sweet, fresh.  
  
/The only way to live a good life is to follow you're emotions./  
  
He'd never been good, didn't think he ever could be, but he'd been dead for far too long. He wanted to live again.  
  
He broke it off and breathed in before speaking. "I can't be gentle Minister."  
  
She ran her hands down the side of his face, lips swollen and eyes a hazy deep blue.   
  
"My name is Relena, and I won't be broken."  
  
She kissed him again. This time he kissed her back, earning a soft sound of surprise from deep in her throat. Something stronger then his regret or own guilt broke through the shelter of silent darkness he'd been retreating into since Quatre and he had broken. Something much rawer then anger fueled his touches and made him hungry for more of her. His lips burned across her mouth. There would likely be regrets, but those where in the gray mists of the future, and they didn't outweigh the need to connect, to touch.  
  
It was awkward and hurried. Need made his hands rough as he ran his hands through her hair, passion made his senses spin as he bruised the white skin on her neck.  
  
The hard wood under her bit into her bar skin, but she didn't mind, she welcomed the sting of reality it brought. His kiss was too hard, too full of something that she both craved with a hunger she'd never known and was more terrified of then any battle she'd ever seen. His teeth skimmed the flesh of her throat and his hands grasped her hips, sliding the thin fabric up her thighs, over her middle, once it was gone she gave it no more thought. His hands seemed to be everywhere at once, feeling, searching. Both pleasure and pain nipped at her senses till she couldn't identify what was what. But one thing was as clear as the sky was with its ranging storm; she needed more of Trowa Barton. Much more.  
  
Her breath was rushed as she pulled off the damp white shirt that covered him, the feel of it on her bare skin having gone far past agitating. She ran her hands over his skin, thrilled at the way he felt over her. His skin was smooth and warm under her touch. The amazing deference between the hardness of muscle under silk smooth skin compared to the memory of Dorothy's soft flesh, made her head whirl, but the change was not an unpleasant one.  
  
His mouth was over hers again, teasing her lips open as she spread her hands over his chest, fingers brushing softly over his nipples. Her tongue followed his in drawn breath, between his teeth, caressing him with a fierceness that drew a husky sound from the back of his throat.  
  
He slid his hands under her, taking a moment to register the teal lace of her bra before unclasping it and flinging it away. He groaned when her cool hands found the hem of his slacks, undoing the button and pulling the zipper down. In a moment they were gone and nothing separated them. He leaned down to teste her, her legs moving around him as she withered under him, her soft moans of passion tempting him on. But he was merciless as moved his lips over the swell of her breast while his hands held her. Her taste was addictive, her curves fascinating to him as he explored her. Desire heated his blood.  
  
"Trowa...now."  
  
Relena gasped the bar of his shoulders, as he entered her in one thrust. A muffled cry left her throat as her body tried to adjust to him. The discomfort swiftly disappeared and was replaced with the need to get his closer. She held nothing back as he began to move with in her, urging him on, pushing him as far as she dared and then more. Slowly, erotically, they moved together as the storm played it's own symphony of lighting and thunder above them.  
  
She cried out when her own climax hit her, crashing over her wave after wave. She held him tightly as Trowa came just after her, his sweat mingling with her own. She didn't let go when the tenseness left his body-suddly afraid of what would happen when he left-alone. He didn't move away from her, to her great relief, but found a more comfortable way of them to lay in. For the first time in a long time she didn't know if she should have been afraid or content to feel safe. He mind swam with all the problems this night could bring and how complicated she'd made things. Unsure of what the sin would bring and arms stung about him, her head buried in his shoulder she gave into sleep.  
  
Trowa stared down at the woman resting in his arms. She was lost in an unpleasant dream. Every time she stirred he'd run his hands down over the sleek path of her shoulders, to her wrists and still her, only to repeat the action again. He wondered what it was that troubled her sleep. Was it Dorothy? Or was it him? A small voice deep in the back of his head didn't want it to be either. Another part of him wished he didn't care and told him he should have been able to just get up and walk away. He hadn't realized giving himself to her would wrench him out of that dark place he'd survived for so long in. That she'd drag him into feeling again, with her eyes that were so deferent from Quatre's, when he'd hoped and wished he'd lost the hard in coming ability.  
  
He picked her up with a gentleness he damned and treaded softly through the darkness to the nearest guest room. Setting her bare frame in between the sheets, he meant to pull away, but the still young and sleeping Minister mumbled and held on to him, her cheek resting on his shoulder. The former mercenary ignored the voice that said he'd surly be damned for this and slid in beside her. The warmth of nearness and physical weariness lured the Latin man into sleep.  
  
The sun has just began to rise over the horizon in a blase, setting the ocean on fire with it's kiss when the sound of someone's voice disturbed her from sleep.  
  
"Relena. Relena, wake up."  
  
She opened one tired blue eye and looked into an emerald green one. A sense of forcoming roused her fully, and made her forget embarrassment at being completely naked.  
  
"What is it?" she asked. Unease twisted her middle. Trowa was silent for a moment.  
  
"Quatre and Dorothy are here."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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	5. Chapter Five

  
  
A Symphony of Ashes  
Part 5/7  
By Revena  
  
  
"I can't just leave it like this. Once upon a time I loved him. Too much to just...."  
  
"Your heart is far too large, Quatre Winner."  
  
He looked at her from under gold bangs, sky blue, deep and full of worry. It was difficult for her to imagine that this kind creature had struck fear into the countless hearts of soldiers, had fought battles of heated medal and crimson blood. She didn't know how he planed to make it though this battle with only his heart and honesty to fight with. How *was* this war of four  
people to end she wondered.  
  
Dorothy, will you dance with me just a little longer?  
  
Trying to waltz your way to the moon, are you, Miss Relena?  
  
Is that a yes?  
  
Dorothy paused with her lover before a set of oak doors. Her dance with Relena Dorlain was over. And like any good star-crossed story, the end of the tale meant farewells and a journey that would push and shove it's way, if need be, out of the past and into something new. This was a Good-bye she did not look forward to, but the woman in her, the one that had stumbled blindly into loving a strong willed Relena, refused to leave split ends to the wind.  
  
A slender hand slipped into hers. She glanced down at where they joined, her mood changing from tunnel vision determination to solemn. She had never counted on this when she first met him and would have laughed in the face of anyone who said she'd end-up in a complicated scandal with Quatre Winner. But then she had never counted on falling for a girl fit to be a queen either.  
  
She had failed Relena. Or maybe they had failed each other. Nonetheless she would make this work, hold on to this light as best she could and not let it go. This time the Symphony would not end. This time it would not burn to ashes. Quatre's love and her promise to keep it was the only salvation she had left to offer. That, and an apology that had no hope of mending all the wrongs she had done. But it was a start.  
  
"Are you ready, Dorothy?" Quatre's eyes shone with sympathy but behind that was a quiet strength that told her he was prepared to take whatever lay beyond those two inches of thick oak. She smiled and held her head to a slight angle.  
  
The sun was just barely peeking out over the ocean. Dark clouds rimed the bright sphere, causing a contrast of light and dark over the small still sleeping city. It was like being given a glimpse of heaven from a world of shadows. Trowa leaned on the open windowsill to watch it.  
  
Would he ever make it to such a place? His thoughts came to a pause before they really began as his attention was drawn to a white vehicle pulling up in the drive way. He watched without expression as the two body exited the vehicle and walked up the path together. It seemed that the question of looking for them had been solved. He should have known better. It wasn't in  
Quatre to simply leave and not say good-bye. His heart just didn't work that way.  
  
He watched Dorothy's face intently silently wondering what type of person the wars had forged her into. She still wielded that gold mane of hair and lilac eyes that reminded him of his sister's. She was also nervous. Was the former sabotage specialist really so weary of what might wait beyond those doors? In the scheme of things, Trowa didn't blame her.  
  
He let his head fall back on the side the wall as his eyes watched Quatre take her hand and mummer a few words to her. So it really was to end. He didn't need the evidence of a kiss or hug to verify what he already knew. With Quatre, the small gesture of affection was enough.  
  
He slipped off the edge as they disappeared in. Walking to the closet he pulled out a pair of dark slacks and a black short sleeve shirt. Barefoot he padded silently to the side of the twin size bed to wake its occupant. She lay in sleeping disarray of sand colored hair, pale skin and white sheets. The Minister was not what he would call beautiful. She was more elegant then  
that with a solid will that kept her back strait and chin up in defiance of what people said. Relena Dorlain was like a painting he decided. Something you had to look at time and time again to see what was there. He had to wonder how the Minister would handle what was about to happen. What would she show him this time?  
  
"Relena. Relena, wake up."  
  
The woman in question answered him with an unlady like groan as she slowly came to full awakness.  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"Quatre and Dorothy are here."  
  
Her face held an unreadable expression. He waited for her to say something but was met with a pensive stare. He should have said something comforting .  
  
"I'll get you some clothes."  
  
Relena could only nod a mute thanks as she tried to call upon some force of will to keep the tears and anger at bay. For her, morning had come far, far too soon.  
  
Quatre held her hand in his as much for her assurance as his. Outside he was calm and controlled, but inside was a completely different story. Apprehension and guilt twisted in him. He could feel Dorothy's eyes on him, emotion she would not let show tightening her hold. He turned and gave her a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.  
  
"I'm not going to leave you Dorothy." He touched her cheek. "I promise."  
  
The blond walked into the large living room, Dorothy at his side. Time seemed to sand still at the sight of Trowa and Relena coming down the star case. But Relena's presence was little more than a breath that passed over his awareness, not while Trowa's eyes bore into his. For a breathless moment every word they had ever shared, every moment he'd ever had with the pilot came back to him in a rush, stinging his heart and twisting a soul that was  
already too weary.  
  
You can let go, Trowa. I would never hurt you  
  
It's not me I'm worried about  
  
At twenty-four Quatre was still a person of tears. Seeing the one he'd loved since he was fifteen made the dampness in his eyes blur his vision. Knowing he'd hurt him in the worse possible way tightened his chest. The blond Arab didn't like how this had happened or how it was about to end. He hadn't meant for the space to grow between them and the ash of burnt promises to sever them apart. He never wanted for what they had, to bleed like it did.  
  
"Trowa," he said.  
  
"Quatre."  
  
Dorothy slipped away and followed Relena into the side room. There was an unbearable silence.  
  
"Trowa, I'm-" he started  
  
"No apologies, Quatre." Trowa reached out and touched the side of his face with severe reverence. "We're past those, I think."  
  
"I'm not sure what happened between us," the blond spoke. "I don't know ."  
  
The former 03 pilot with drew his hand, searching for the right words. But what did one say to a dream that died?  
  
"Quatre...you..gave me comfort when I deserved no comfort. Gave yourself to me when I deserved no gifts...I..." This was harder then he thought it would be. "I loved you, I think a part of me will always belong to you. We were a lot like that ocean you love so much. Always moving, always changing."  
  
Quatre...  
  
Yes, Trowa?  
  
Do you think its possible to actually be a part of someone forever?  
  
I want to be a part of you forever, Trowa. So it has to be possible.  
  
"We moved and we changed. There can be no 'I'm sorry's' for that. "  
  
Trowa reacted in time to catch Quatre in his arms and stubbornly refused to acknowledge the dampness in his eyes. Please, Quatre he thought, please tell me you love her. Tell me the looks I saw you giving her were real. Because if those were real...  
  
"Tell me she makes you happy, Quatre. Tell me and I can let go." And maybe he'd salvage what was left of himself and find contentment.  
  
Because if those were real...  
  
He felt Quatre's tears dampen his neck and held him tighter, surrendering to the feel of Quatre's arms around him one last time. Waiting to burn it into his memory and not let it go.  
  
"Yes, she makes me happy. I love her. Some times I wish I didn't, but I do." Trowa pushed himself away and held the blonde's face, searching his eyes, trying desperately to find the words he needed. This was never a battle he was never good at fighting.  
  
Then *they* had been real. Then that was all that mattered  
  
Could that be it? Would that be all it took, five little utterances that bubbled in his chest? For a split second, that could have been the moment people talk of before they die, the one moment that felt like a million years, he wondered if salvaging their broken dreams and mending the shattered pieces of a marriage that tested every limit there was, could be done. But Quatre's eyes were his soul. They always had been, had he taken the time to read them as he did now. And Trowa saw what they said. Dorothy was the one that kept him in the sunlight, where he belonged. It was Dorothy's love that became Quatre's sea.  
  
I love the ocean, Trowa. It's not like endless sand at all. It's like a living thing with emotions, possible of both love and hate. Not just dry and unforgiving.  
  
Trowa swallowed his emotions, let them struggle on the way down to his middle and pulled back the dampness that threatened to betray the promise he'd made to himself so long ago; to never cry.  
  
"Then that's all that matters."  
  
  
"The cure for anything is salt water-sweat, tears, or the sea."  
~Isak Dinesen  
  
All most to the end people ^^. Many thanks to everyone who has reviewed not only this fic but my other ones as well. Your feed back encourages me to write more and the fact you all take the time to just tell me what you think of the pairing this time, means a whole lot. You guys are the best. Come visit my page ne? Updates there happen a lot faster then my works on here do ><;;  
  
[my page][1]   
  
  


   [1]: http://www.reveena.50megs.com/



	6. Chapter Six

A Symphony of Ashes 6/7  
By r-chan  
  
Relena looked into hazy like gray eyes for a long moment.   
  
They still had the same arcane light that had captured her attention so many years ago. The same sleek sparkle that suggested they knew something you didn't. Dorothy herself still had the familiar air of smooth sophistication she'd always possessed.  
  
Relena noticed something more as she looked at her former lover for what felt like the first time. The feeling of restlessness the blond had always projected in the past was gone. It was as if the wild part of Dorothy had smoothed out into something more controlled.  
  
Somewhere in her, Relena realized the woman that stud calmly before her was not the same woman she'd fallen in love with. She waited for some sort of pain at that to surface but instead she found acknowledgment. And possibly disappointment.   
  
"Quatre's a complement to you Dorothy."  
  
The blond inclined her head. "You think so?" she smiled fondly at Relena after a moment. "You know, false affability never did suit you. Your always so much better when you're blunt."  
  
"Hn" Relena gave a dry smile under light bangs "You know me so well then Dorothy?"  
  
Quatre's lover let go of her amused gaze and let it turn to something that resembled regret, or possibly a little bit of sadness as she looked upon the Minister.  
  
"No. At one time maybe."  
  
Relena wrapped her arms around her waist and licked her lips. "I knew we were a bad idea you know. But that never stopped me for a minute." She whispered. "Maybe it should have."  
  
Dorothy closed the space between them and put her slender hands on the other girl's shoulders. She looked tragically childlike in the too big button-down shirt, her hair loose around her narrow shoulders, eyes cast down at the oriental carpet. Quite unlike the strong willed and suborn woman the world had both loved and ridiculed in the past.  
  
Relena looked up and stared into those gray eyes, not sure what she was looking for." I tried to listen to the music you spoke of so often. I could never hear it Dorothy. Whenever I tried I felt like I was loosing something I was never meant to win."  
  
"There is no time for regrets in this life Miss Relena. For us, this was a battle we both failed in." Dorothy reached out and moved a stay lock of honey colored hair behind Relena's ear. " The story will move on, and you must go with it."  
  
The Minister straitened slightly. "And how is this chapter to end?"  
  
Dorothy moved away from the blond walked back to the double doors. She stopped as she placed her hands on the cold brass knobs, aware of the pair of sea blue eyes that bore into her from behind.  
  
"With no regrets. " she anwered  
  
"No regrets."   
  
Dorothy turned the handles but paused, turning her head , hair falling over one shoulder, but never quite looking back.  
  
"I knew we were a bad idea too. And that never stopped me. Not for a minute."  
  
Dorothy swung the doors open and walked out, leaving Relena behind her.   
  
  
Please review, flame or not, I'd love to hear what you think. If you get a minute here's a link to my page. Why don't you drop by and take a look ne?  
  
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   [1]: http://www.reveena.50megs.com/



	7. Chapter Seven

A Symphony of Ashes 7/7  
By r-chan  
  
He found her by the window again. Only this time she was sitting under it, her arms around her knees, head resting on her arms. Loose hair around her shoulders.  
  
Behind her the noon sun shown through the clouds and into the large den. He leaned on one of the two door frames, his arms folded, looking out but not really seeing. He felt worn and tired inside. As if he'd just finished a one man battle that had gone on for years. In a way he supposed he had. He had the scars to prove it afterall. They were the most horrible and wonderful type of pain in the world.   
  
Seeing Quatre walk away with Dorothy had shattered something in him that was already broken. And in the place Quatre had been, there was a dull ache that might not ever truly leave him.   
  
But it was a reminder that he was alive. Something he was never sure he'd be able to do without the blue eyed boy. It was simple to live when he was doing it for someone else. But to live for himself? Trowa hadn't thought he could do it.  
  
Now he knew better.  
  
"I have to apologize to you Trowa."  
  
The green eyed ex-pilot blinked in surprise. Relena looked across at him from the other end room, blue eyes tainted with a touch of hesitation.  
  
"I used you. I had no right to do that."  
  
Trowa raised an eyebrow at her. "I knew what was going on. I could have easily stopped what happened. There's no need to apologize."  
  
She answered him with a coy half smile. "Could you really?" she asked.  
  
"Hn" he shifted positions so his back rested on the frame then turned his head to look at her again. She looked impossibly small and childlike in the too big slacks and white shirt that all but hung off her slender frame.  
  
"It may have proved to be somewhat difficult." He said after a while. He was pleased to note her smile came fully this time as she surrendered to a small laugh.  
  
"I used you too. But for deferent reasons then your own Relena." He added softy once the minutes began to pass by them and the air grew a bit too think in silence.  
  
Relena nodded at the brown haired man. " I know." She whispered.   
  
Trowa stared out the window. One question nagged at him and after another moment he give in to it "So what now?" he asked.  
  
"What now? Now is up to fate...and us." she answered.  
  
"I don't believe in fate."  
  
"Good. I don't either."   
  
"So it's just us, ne?"  
  
"It seems that way." Relena said.  
  
There was a pause. Then Trowa smirked "I can live with that."  
  
Relena raised one eyebrow and smirked back at the tall man"Oh, happy to oblige, Mr. Barton."  
  
She watched quitely as Trowa's tall frame moved across the room and sat down next to her.   
  
The blond haired woman looked over at him in question. A pair of deep green eyes looked back at her unblinking.  
  
"I'm glad."  
  
Relena stared at his neutral expression, speechless. Then smiled again. She turned away and watched the sunlight dance over the walls and shine into the next room. Charming tones of red and gold fell over light cream colored carpet and cherry wood furniture.  
  
"No regrets Mr.Barton?"  
  
"None at all Minister Darlian."  
  
  
  
That's the long awaited end to a Symphony of Ashes. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did writing it. By all means, review and tell me what you think. ^^ If you get a chance swing by my page and drop me a line ne?  
  
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